Conference Contributions /HS

Recent Submissions

Svalin, KlaraPublication in Abstracts of the XXXIInd International Congress on Law and Mental Health; (2011)International Academy for Law and Mental Health, Berlin, July 17-23 2011

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English abstract:

The purpose of the study was to examine the relation between victimisation and violent crime among a group of children and adolescents who attended Psychiatric Child and Youth Clinics in Stockholm, Sweden. It also sought to compare victimised girls and boys in terms of their use of violence. Data is drawn from The Stockholm Child-psychiatric database which consists of approximately 7600 children and adolescents who consulted the Psychiatric Child and Youth Clinics (BUP) in the county of Stockholm. The children were born in 1981-1989, and finished their contacts with the Psychiatric Child and Youth Clinics between 2003 and 2005. The “victimization” variable was defined as neglected physical and/or mental health care. Data on violent crime was received from the Swedish crime statistics, and concerned those with police records of violent crime. The study showed that children and adolescents who had been victimised (N=354) were found guilty of violent crime significantly more often compared to those who have not been victimised, with the trend being more pronounced amongst the girls than the boys. Knowledge of possible violence risk factors may contribute to the development of violence risk assessment and management. The results from the study along with possible explanations for the findings will be discussed.

Torstensson Levander, MariePublication in Abstracts of the XXXIInd International Congress on Law and Mental Health; : International Academy of Law and Mental Health (2011)International Academy for Law and Mental Health, Berlin, July 17-23 2011

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English abstract:

This study examines how child and adolescent referrals to psychiatric child and youth clinics are associated with ethnicity and neighbourhood of residence. Four sources of referrals are examined: family referrals, social/legal agency referrals, school referrals and health/mental health referrals. Referrals of 2054 children aged 11-19 from the Stockholm Child-Psychiatric Database were studied using multilevel logistic regression. Results indicate the importance of ethnicity for child and adolescent referrals to psychiatric child and youth clinics. Family referrals were more common among children and adolescents of Swedish background than among those of immigrant background. Referrals by social/legal agencies were more common among children and adolescents of African and Asian background, while children of Asian or South American background were more likely to have been referred by schools or by the health/mental health care sector. A significant neighbourhood effect was found only in relation to family referrals (i.e. it was more likely to be referred to psychiatric child and youth clinics by the family in some neighbourhoods than in other neighbourhoods). These
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findings have significant implications for the design and evaluation of community mental health outreach programs and should be considered when developing strategies intended to help children and adolescents with mental health problems.
Victimization and Violent Crime among Children and Ad

Ivert, Anna-KarinPublication in Abstracts of the XXXIInd International Congress on Law and Mental Health; : International Academy of Law and Mental Health (2011)International academy of law and mental health, Berlin, July 17-23, 2011.

other

English abstract:

The aim of this study is to assess the effect of neighbourhood socioeconomic disadvantage on violent crime among a group of children and adolescents who attended Psychiatric Child and Youth Clinics in Stockholm, Sweden. Data is drawn from The Stockholm Child-psychiatric database, which consists of approximately 7600 children and adolescents who consulted the Psychiatric Child and Youth Clinics (PBU) in the county of Stockholm. The children were born in 1981-1989, and finished their contacts with the Psychiatric Child and Youth Clinics between 2003 and 2005. Using multilevel techniques, incidences of violent crime in police registers were related to characteristics of the neighbourhood where the children and adolescents lived. About 7 percent of the variance in violent crime incidents is found at the neighbourhood level. Controlling for individual characteristics reduces the between-neighbourhood variance, though a significant neighbourhood effect remains. When neighbourhood-level disadvantage is added to the model, the between-neighbourhood variance in incidence of violent crime is further reduced, but still significant. This implies that neighbourhood characteristics, in addition to individual characteristics, should be considered in the design and development of psychiatric care for children, and for the development of strategies to prevent future criminality.

Cross-community work is a method to work against social injustice by letting two groups of people with different economic, ethnic or religious background meet for mutual experience. Two school classes, during the school years 3-5, from two very different districts of the segregated city of Malmo, have met regularly. The aims have been, when working together, the children should get a deeper understanding and knowledge of each other and the possibility to get new friends with another background than themselves. The overall aim was to fight prejudice and segregation. A Research Circle is a dialogue meeting with teachers and researchers from Malmo University. In such a Research Circle during the school year 2009, teachers working in the above mentioned school classes, reflected on their experiences of cross community work together with me as a researcher. In the paper I will describe and discuss teachers reflected experiences on concrete actions and why some school class meetings but not others, in their opinion, could be seen as good examples but not others. The dialogue schoolwork as Cross-community work, in the paper, is discussed and linked to the Contact hypothesis.

Problem: It is claimed that there are more than 400 kinds of psychotherapy. Is this true? What are the common characteristics that make these the same kind of practice? How does one differentiate between what is psychotherapy and what is not (e.g. psychiatry, coaching, education, philosophical counseling, meditation)? A clear definition would help us answer these questions.
Aim: This is an attempt to define the concept of “psychotherapy”. I start by critically scrutinizing several definitions suggested by other writers and then present and argue for my own suggestion.
Method: The method used is philosophical, or conceptual. This means that I try to state the necessary and jointly sufficient characteristics of the term in question. The starting point is that all kinds of psychotherapy share some characteristics, without which they would not qualify as psychotherapy, and that it is these core characteristics that constitute the practice.
Result: Psychotherapy is the interaction between two or more persons, a client and a therapist, where the latter is trained (at least to some degree), based on some kind of general theory of therapy and personality change, where the aim is to create significant and lasting positive quality-of-life-related mental changes, involving several aspects of the person’s mental “faculties” (cognition, emotion, perception, volition, attitudes, or values), where the means to reach these goals are mainly verbal (but sometimes also non-verbal), and this interacting is primarily what leads to the positive change. A practice that does not fulfill these “minimal” requirements will not count as psychotherapy.